Hot, hot, hot.
It is really hot here now.
And no, I don't want to hear that it is hotter in other places because I would like to get some understanding and sympathy, mostly sympathy, for the hot weather here in Tokyo, the heat island. Tall buildings, loads of people and plenty of asphalt and concrete. On top of that, not many green areas, a couple of parks but that is it. Even though Tokyo, as many other cities, is a city by the sea, I have yet to see the ocean. That is not completely true, as I have seen the ocean, but it is indeed difficult to both see and feel the ocean here in Tokyo.

Anyhow, I am about to flee the country......at least for a couple of weeks. Hopefully that with cool things down a bit. But then again, coming back in the end of August.....the very same weather that I left will still be around, so it will only be a temporary improvement. The heat is here to stay at last until mid September and probably longer than that.

PUH!

A couple of weeks ago I wrote that spring was here. Today it almost felt like summer was here. Of course not the real summer, since summer here is terrible with humid and hot weather, around 35 C. This might sound like nothing to some people but for an Eskimo like me from northern Europe it is much too hot.

Apparently it is ok to say Eskimo if you are talking about a native Alaskan according to my MA-holder-in-anthropology partner.

Spring is here!
At last winter might be over and spring is here. Today it is 15C and it will stay almost that for the rest of the week. It is strange that I like winter and the cold, but...not here. Here it is almost (a little lie I know) as cold inside as it is outside. I have no problem with cold in general but when it is cold inside it really gets to me. I think the reason why many people that live in cold places can stand the cold outside is that whenever they go out they are usually warm.

An experiment of mine.
I am certain that you can stand, let's say minus 5C, for two minutes even if you are naked if you were warm to start with. Now here in Japan you are never warm because the body never gets the chance to be warm since it is cold inside too. Meaning that even if you dress up really well when you go out, you still feel cold. Clothes themselves don't warm you. They retain the heat coming from your body. Hence with no body heat, nothing to retain. You feel cold.

Now, hopefully that won't be a problem for the next 9 months since spring is here (?). Now if only they could finish building on that new flat complex next to us it would be great. Today is suppose to be the last day, but I am not so sure.